one of the reasons we are at the fiscal cliff is the republican resolution was under the tacit assumption that they would control the white house, so who cared about everything stacked against them. the main problem was obama ran an absolutely brilliant campaign. republicans had a very weak field, and romney was the best of a very weak field. he himself was a very odd candidate. after the financial crisis, a man essentially of wall street, and a man whose essential issue of the 2010 campaign was obamacare, but he had passed something similar in massachusetts. he had two strikes against him, which made it very difficult begins the difficult rigid discipline obama to win. >> i think obama won because republicans underestimated him, and they did it through sell collision that goes back to 2010 when they considered this to be a referendum on barack obama. it was not a referendum on barack obama. it was a referendum on the economy and the incumbent, but not barack obama the person. republicans left the race feeling like this would be a slam-dunk in 2012. they missed the fact that the turnout i